


So long as men can breathe or eyes can see

by tabacoychanel



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-17
Updated: 2012-06-17
Packaged: 2017-11-07 22:55:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,030
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/436351
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tabacoychanel/pseuds/tabacoychanel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>And I am coming home to you / With my own blood in my mouth / And I am coming home to you / If it’s the last thing that I do</p>
            </blockquote>





	So long as men can breathe or eyes can see

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the songprompt "Sax Rohmer #1" by The Mountain Goats.

After they took away her eyes, she would recall the blind young acolyte she had seen lighting the candles. The kindly old man had said he was guided by their scent and by the heat of the flame. Arya burned herself twice before she went to Umma the cook for an unguent. In truth the smell of burnt flesh did not bother her; it mixed with the smell of smoke and snow and pine needles, a blend so achingly familiar and yet entirely out of place here in the House of Black and White.  
  
Since she had taken charge of lighting the candles, there had been no sign of the young acolyte whose task it used to be. _And how would you know him even if he was standing right in front of you, unless he let you touch his face?_ For all she knew, he’d gotten a new face by now. If this was a trial that the Many-Faced God routinely set his servants, then Arya would not give Him the satisfaction of rejecting her. Of course, it was unlikely that the source of her blindness was divinely inspired. Yet every night she swallowed the bitter brew they brought her without complaint, because she was not going to give the kindly old man that satisfaction either.  
  
While Arya had a healthy respect for Him of Many Faces, she did not believe – as the kindly old man insisted – that He was all the gods and none of them. If she believed in anything it was in her pack, the dreams where she prowled the Riverlands with her packmates at her back, the dreams so real that when she sat up on her straw mattress and opened her sightless eyes it was like one of her limbs had been cut off. She believed in the timbre of Robb’s laughter and the scent of Sansa’s hair, the pressure of Jon’s callused fingertips against the back of her skull as he mussed her hair with his other hand. _He would come and watch me and Bran go at it with tourney swords in the yard, and I’d always win even though Bran got weapons practice with Ser Rodrik and I got needlework with Septa Mordayne. Jon would flash me a grin and say, “That’s my girl.”_  
  
She groped for her stick and found it leaning against the wall. Tapping her way around the bodies of corpses and worshippers, she came to the door. The hinges groaned open. It was the black of night, just like it was the last time she padded down these steps. She’d been naked as her name day then, and she bent down now to remove her slippers so she could feel the rough contours of the stone under her bare feet. She counted the number of steps in her head, of course, but she knew when she got to the loose stone because she knew the feel of it. She scrabbled at the edges with her fingernails until she could dig her hand into the crack to lift the stone. There was nothing underneath.  
  
Arya’s heart stopped beating.  
  
In Sansa’s songs when the gallant knight saw the fair maid his heart would stop beating at the sight of her, but in real life people couldn’t afford to behave like that. Nobody could afford to stop eating and sleeping and killing just because of some sentimental nonsense. Arya got shakily to her feet, not bothering to replace the stone, and stumbled back into the temple in search of the kindly old man.  
  
When he came to her, what felt like hours later, he said only, “There are three more corpses, their pockets heavy with coin.”  
  
“Where did you put it?” she demanded.  
  
“Will you not attend to them? Have you tired of serving the Many-Faced God?”  
  
“Don’t be stupid. I’ll take care of them later. I want my sword back.”  
  
“Yours?” he asked. “Who are you?”  
  
The words “no one” were on the tip of her tongue. They wouldn’t get her Needle back, though. “I am Arya of House Stark, and I will have what’s mine.”  
  
“You are a long way from home, Arya of House Stark.”  
  
“I have no home. It burned down, so I’m here, and I’ve promised the Many-Faced God all the rest, but he can’t have Needle.”  
  
“Then your home has not burned,” the kindly old man explained gently. “Your home is here, in the thing you will not give up when you have forsaken all the rest.”  
  
Arya drew a sharp, indignant breath. “What does the Many-Faced God care about Needle? I stopped doing needlework. I put it away. It’s none of His business.”  
  
“Child, He cares because you care. Those of us who serve Him of Many Faces know that death is a gift which delivers us from life’s suffering. Yet there is something in this life you value more than death.”  
  
There was.  
  
She realized now that the candles did not smell like home because they reminded her of _Winterfell_ ; it was because they reminded her of Jon. She was prepared to spend the rest of her life stone blind if she could only see him smile again, the smile that transformed his austere features into the most magical thing she had seen or ever would see. What was the point of _seeing_ if she couldn’t see Jon?  
  
In the Vale she had tried to convince the Hound to go North. She had blood on her hands and while her mother and Robb loved her, they were also bent on taming her. They thought the only way to keep her safe was to marry her off, bless their deluded souls. Jon would simply gather her up in his arms – a little bundle of bones, he called her – and carry her somewhere wolves could run free and highborn girls could fight and she would never outgrow being his little sister, never.  
  
“I’m going home,” she announced. She held out her left hand, and when she felt Needle slip into her palm she gripped the hilt tight, like she was not going to let go.  
  
“ _Valar morghulis_ , Arya Stark.”  
  
“Not till I go home.”


End file.
